Even When I Hated You
by ShineyStar
Summary: Gabriella and Troy have been a playing a game for the last two years. When Gabriella realises that she has to kiss Troy in order to win, will she do it? Please read! TxG Thanks :


Hey guys

**Hey guys! Sorry for the lack of updates recently. I've been back at school and have just entered my first year of GCSE's – talk about hectic! Jeez, I've had barely any free time. Just another one shot for you guys, sorry. I promise you guys that I AM working on chapter 9 of 'Why are you helping me?' it's just that I'm starting to lose faith in the story. So please, please PM me and tell me if you think I should carry on with it.**

**Even When I Hated You…**

She was angry. No, she was furious. He had really done it this time. The fact that he had the nerve to actually to do it was beyond her. Gabriella Montez seethed with fury as she walked down the main corridor of East High, her eyes searching for the crowds of students, eagerly waiting for the weekend, for the one person who could make her whole body tremble with anger. Troy Bolton. Easy High's golden boy – the one girls longed for, and the boy that boys longed to be. Everyone liked him…well everyone except a certain brunette who continued to walk down corridor, heading towards his locker.

Troy Bolton stood at his locker, surrounded by his team-mates, who were slapping his back and high-fiving each other as they celebrated their captain's victory. And his trophy? Well, it was a bra. Gabriella's bra to be precise. Her black, lacy bra to be even more precise. The garment was currently hanging in his locker, waiting for it to be reclaimed by its owner – the owner who was storming towards the locker at this very moment.

"Hand it over." Gabriella approached Troy, ignoring the sniggers from his team-mates, and glaring right into Troy's ocean blue eyes, that seemed to twinkle with triumph.

"Hand what over?" Troy replied innocently, his eyes flicking over Gabriella's petite body. He wasn't going to deny it – she was gorgeous. Probably the prettiest girl in the school. Her high prominent cheek-bones, her glossy dark curls that tumbled past her shoulders, her slim body and her oh, so tempting lips…

"You know fucking well what, Bolton." Gabriella snapped back, completely aware of his stare, his stare that was currently lingering on her chest. "You know, when I talk to someone, I like it when they look at my face and not at my chest." She spoke smoothly, and Troy's head snapped up to hers, smirking.

"Yeah well…I still have no idea what you're on about Montez." He responded, smirking even more Gabriella took a step towards him.

"Stop being such a smartass, I can see it in your locker." Gabriella said, attempting to reach around Troy's well built body, but was forced to stop when one of his hands grabbed her elbow. Damn his quick reflexes.

"Not so fast Montez." Troy smirked, clearly enjoying how frustrated Gabriella was becoming. "You're gonna have to wait. You can have it back at the end of the day, _after_ you've congratulated me on winning. Gabriella blinked. What? He thinks he's won? Gabriella scoffed.

"You think you've won? Puh-lease! This is far from being over – and if you think I'm going to congratulate you on stealing on of my bra's, then you've lost your ever fucking mind, Bolton.

"Language, Montez." Troy smirked again. "Well, I expect you to congratulate me, unless you want your bra to be…I dunno, in the trophy cabinet?" Troy said, watching as Gabriella's dark coffee brown eyes, narrowed.

"You wouldn't dare." She responded, taking another step towards him, suddenly realising how much taller he was than her – a good four inches or so.

"Wouldn't I? I went through all the trouble of stealing it – do you really think it'll be that much trouble to lock it in the trophy cabinet, for the whole school to see?" Troy watched as Gabriella contemplated what he had just said. He had her, he was sure of it. Gabriella sighed in defeat.

"What do I need to do?" Gabriella asked, watching as Troy grinned in triumph.

"Hmm…" Troy pretended to think about it, as he knew what he wanted her to do, as did the rest of the basketball team, who had been watching their argument the whole time.

"Well?" Gabriella demanded, determined to get away from him. "Today would be nice, Bolton. The sooner I get to stop breathing the same air as you and your lunkhead team, the better." She said, ignoring the 'oooo's' that erupted from Troy's team-mates.

"Well, I can't help it if your standing so close to me…" Troy responded, grinning when Gabriella realised her position, and swiftly took a big step backwards. "Anways…you kiss me."

"Excuse me?" Gabriella asked, crossing her arms over her chest.

"You wanted to know what you needed to do to congratulate me, and I told you. You have to kiss me." Troy said, watching Gabriella's perfect face for some sort of a reaction. To his surprise, Gabriella just smiled and rolled her eyes.

"Are you really that immature, Troy?" She asked, taking a step towards him, again. Troy stood a little straighter.

"Let's just say that I am still waiting for the kiss that never came…you know, when we were fifteen." He responded coolly. Gabriella was shocked – that was the first time Troy had ever mentioned their past since they had stopped being best friends.

"I didn't know you remembered that…" Gabriella said, thinking back to the day where her and Troy had come so close to kissing, only to be interrupted by Gabriella's best friend Sharpay, who suddenly showed up, screaming about how her dad had taken all eight of her credit cards off of her, after she completely maxed out one of them – the one with the 8,000 dollar limit. Typical.

"Yeah well, I do." Troy said, and watched Gabriella as she took another step towards, stopping right in front of him, one hand on his arm. "So, what about that kiss?" he asked, holding his breath as Gabriella smiled. She leaned up to him, stopping when her lips were just breath widths away from his own.

"Not a chance in hell." She said, and dropped down to the souls of her feet and stepped away from him. Troy could barely suppress his groan of frustration. He had come close, so close. Before he could respond, Gabriella suddenly raised one of her hands, and slapped him forcefully across the cheek.

"Congratulations." She said before turning on her heel and walking down the corridor, not looking back once, leaving a very confused and frustrated Troy, holding his cheek and watching her hips swaying from side to side. He groaned. It was going to be a long day.

--

"You did what?!" Gabriella winced at the shrill question that had just erupted from her best friend's mouth.

"I slapped him." She responded simply. "He told me that I had to kiss him, so I slapped him." Gabriella said, shrugging her shoulders slightly, smiling as her other best friend, Taylor burst out laughing.

"Wow, Gab's! I didn't know you had it in you!" she said, giving Gabriella a high-five. Gabriella giggled slightly, and turned back to Sharpay who looked deep in thought.

"Shar?" Gabriella asked, waving her hand in front of Sharpay's face. Sharpay simply blinked and turned to Gabriella.

"Do it." She said. Gabriella furrowed her perfectly shaped eyebrows.

"What?" She asked, confused at her best friends sudden change in demeanour.

"Kiss him." Sharpay replied, grinning slightly.

"Are you kidding me?!" Gabriella exclaimed, looking at Sharpay as if she were crazy.

"Seriously Gabs, think about it. Troy obviously wants to kiss you, and if you do, he'll only want more. It's a perfect way to get back at him – torture him. Kiss him once, and refuse to kiss him again, it'll drive him mad." Sharpay said, grinning at her ever so clever plan.

"You know, Blondie has a point." Taylor said thoughtfully. "It _would _drive him mad – and you'll clearly win!"

Gabriella sat in silence as she took in what her friends were saying. Should she kiss him? Gabriella looked over to where Troy was sitting, at his normal lunch table, surrounded by jocks and cheerleaders, joking and throwing food into his best friend's precious afro. Gabriella smiled slightly. He was sort of cute…oh who was she kidding. He was attractive, devastatingly so. His short brown hair that always resembled bed hair, his amazingly tanned and well built body, and his eyes…

"Gabs?" Gabriella was broken out of her daydream and she turned her head back to her best friends who were looking both curious yet excited.

"So, are you gonna do it?" Sharpay asked, sitting forward on her seat.

"Um…I dunno. Do I just walk over there and kiss him? Or do I corner him and do it when nobodies watching.

"Oh no. Do it here. Now. For everyone to see. No-one will believe you did it otherwise." Taylor said, Sharpay nodding in agreement. Gabriella took a deep breath, and slowly nodded.

"Fine. I'll do it." She said, standing up. Taylor and Sharpay beamed.

"Good luck." They both said. Gabriella nodded and began to walk to Troy's table.

"Uh oh. Montez alert." Chad whispered, nodding his head over to where Gabriella was walking.

"Huh?" Troy turned his head, and was shocked to see Gabriella walking towards him, a determined gleam in her eye. Troy rose his eyebrows questioningly as Gabriella approached him. What was she doing?

Gabriella saw Troy turn to look at her, and look at her questioningly. She watched as he slowly rose from the table, standing still as he watched her come closer. The whole cafeteria was silent, and they all held their breaths as they watched Gabriella walking towards Troy. Gabriella took a deep breath and stopped just in front of Troy, who was staring at her, confused at her actions, but secretly enticed. Before, he said anything Gabriella reached up and wound her arms around her neck, crashing her lips onto his. She felt Troy tense up but then immediately relax into her, returning the kiss ever so passionately. Time seemed to stop, and neither one of them heard to shocked gasps fill the air as they continued to kiss. Gabriella wound her arms round Troy's neck tighter, caught up in the moment, but was suddenly brought back to reality as she felt Troy run his tongue along her full bottom lip, begging her for entrance. Gabriella immediately jerked backwards, breaking the kiss. Breathing heavily, she let her arms fall from his neck. Slowly she lifted her head to look at Troy and for once, she couldn't decipher his emotions. His face was expressionless, his lips were swollen from the intensity and his eyes were darker than normal. Filled with lust, maybe?

"Um…" Gabriella tried to gain her breath back. "Meet me at your locker, at the end of school. I want my bra back." And with that, she turned around and made her way to the doors of the cafeteria. As she went, she glanced to see Taylor and Sharpay giving her the thumbs up. Smiling to herself, Gabriella exited the cafeteria and suddenly, chaos erupted.

Troy's swollen lips slowly broke out into a smile, and his ran his tongue along his bottom lip, savouring the sweet taste of Gabriella's kiss. Troy's daze was broken when Chad let out a low whistle, and shoved him playfully.

"Dude, how do you do it? I've been bugging McKessie for weeks, and all she does is kick me in the groin…how do I get her to kiss me?" he asked, shaking his head as his best friend continued to stare out of the door that Gabriella had just walked out of.

As soon as she had left the cafeteria, Gabriella ran to the toilets.

"Oh my god, oh my god, oh my GOD!" she chanted over and over again, splashing water on her face. She could not believe she had done it. She had actually kissed Troy Bolton. The same guy who had been her best friends ever since they were both seven, they same guy she had fallen in love with at the tender age of fifteen, the same guy she lost the day after her father had died. Gabriella was too soaked up in her thoughts that she didn't even hear the door to the toilets open.

"Whoa! I cannot believe you did that!" Sharpay exclaimed as she gave Gabriella a tight hug.

"Yeah, you and me both." Gabriella mumbled as she turned back to the mirror. She looked different all of a sudden. It wasn't the fact that her lips were swollen, and it wasn't the faint blush on her cheeks. No, she was glowing. She just looked as if she were glowing. Her tanned skin seemed brighter, her eyes seemed to twinkle more and her lips couldn't seem to stop smiling.

"Oh my god! You enjoyed that kiss!" Taylor exclaimed as she saw the smile that was plastered on Gabriella's lips. Gabriella immediately turned around to face Sharpay and Taylor, trying to look as nonchalant as possible.

"I did not!" she exclaimed, rather inconvincibly as Sharpay and Taylor both rested their hands on the hips, smirking.

"Girl, please, you may as well stamp "I FUCKING LOVED IT!" on your forehead!" Sharpay exclaimed, grinning as a small blush made its way onto Gabriella's cheeks.

"Am I really that obvious?" Gabriella asked, blushing even more when Sharpay and Taylor both nodded their heads.

"Guys what am I gonna do?" Gabriella asked indignantly. "I can't face Troy now! He can't know that I enjoyed it – otherwise, the whole planned is completely screwed!"

"Whoa, Gabs. Chill." Taylor said, as she rubbed Gabriella's arm soothingly. "It'll be fine. You both clearly wanted the kiss, and now that you have, you can just get on with things. The game will be finished, and nothing else has to happen." Taylor concluded, with Sharpay nodding her agreement. Gabriella sighed and ran her hand over her face.

"But…I want something else to happen. I want Troy back."

--

The rest of the day passed quickly for both Troy and Gabriella. Gabriella was thankful that she didn't have any lessons with Troy, and so, avoiding him was easy. Throughout the rest of the day, Gabriella had girls coming up to her, demanding to know if Troy was a good kisser, and what it was like to kiss him. She had random boys coming up to her and 'accidentally' dropping their phone-numbers onto her work, and then telling her to call them. She was sick of it.

Troy could not wait for the final bell. As soon as he was dismissed from his last lesson, he sprinted the whole way to his locker and waited for Gabriella. He was waiting for about five minutes before he spotted her, walking down the corridor, her head held high and looking confident.

Gabriella had told herself to be confident, that she would not falter. She couldn't let Troy get to her, no cocky comments, and he certainly could not see that on the inside, she was crying, desperate to be with him. So, as she walked out from her final lesson, she turned right, and walked down the corridor, towards Troy's locker. As she walked, Gabriella ignored the wistful glances that were being thrown her way – she simply held her head high. But as she drew nearer, as soon as she saw Troy, leaning against his locker, grinning at her, the confidence that she had building since lunchtime drained from her body.

"Uh…hi." Gabriella said meekly. She was staring at his shoulder, because for some reason she just couldn't meet his gaze.

"Hey." Troy grinned at her, seeing that she was nervous. Not wanting to make the situation any more awkward, which given the circumstances, was probably impossible, Troy began to dial his locker combination. Gabriella knew what he was doing and was grateful. She looked up at Troy and saw him smiling to himself as his locker sprung open. She stood silently as Troy fumbled around inside his locker, before his had enclosed on the black, silky garment. Gabriella felt her cheeks burn up as Troy drew his hand out of his locker, holding her bra.

"Here." Troy said awkwardly, holding his hand out to her. Gabriella gave him a small smile and reached out, her fingers gently brushing his as she pulled her bra out of his grasp.

"Thanks." Gabriella said, her cheeks flaming as she stuffed her bra back into her bag. Unable to help himself, Troy began to laugh. Gabriella's head snapped up, and for the first time since arriving, her dark coffee eyes locked on his, his bright blue eyes twinkling with amusement.

"You think this is funny, Bolton?" Gabriella asked, desperately trying to stop her own mouth from curving into a smile.

"Oh, come on." Troy began, leaning against his now closed locker. "You have to admit, it's quite funny. I mean, three years ago, you caught me going through your underwear draw – which may I add, was a dare from Chad – and you said the next time I tried to steal one of your bra's, you'd cut off my arm and hit me with it…but lo and behold, my arm is still attached to my body and instead, I get a kiss from you. A fair exchange, don't you think?" Troy grinned, raising his eyebrows at Gabriella, who was now wearing a small smile.

"Well…I do recall making you a promise when we were fifteen, that I would kiss you – you know, to make up for the one Sharpay so rudely interrupted. So, really, I was just fulfilling my promise, I had no opinion in the matter." Gabriella was now smiling radiantly as Troy took a step towards her.

"Oh really?" He asked, leaning down towards her. "So, you wouldn't mind if I did this?" His last word was whispered against her lips, and before Gabriella even got the chance to ask what he meant, even though she was pretty sure she already did, Troy captured her lips with his in a strong, passionate kiss. This was it. Everything was coming down to this one kiss. Gabriella could either pull away from him and walk away, or she could respond and get Troy back in her life. She didn't even have to think about it. As her eyes fluttered closed, Gabriella slid her arms up Troy's chest and wound them around his neck, tightly, bringing his body closer to hers. Troy responded by encircling his arms around her waist, pressing his body up against hers. When Troy ran his tongue lightly across her bottom lip, Gabriella didn't pull away. Not again. She willingly parted her lips at Troy's invitation and moaned softly as Troy's tongue slowly began to dance with hers.

Troy and Gabriella weren't aware of the fact that nearly half of the school were watching them; they were too submersed in their kiss. Gabriella rose on her tiptoes to gain more height, so she could kiss him with more force. Minutes later, Gabriella pulled away breathlessly, and rested her forehead against Troy's. At the moment, her mind was just a mess, it felt impossible for her to form a sentence. Luckily for her, it was Troy who spoke first.

"Come back to me, Gabi." He whispered against her tingling skin. "Please, I've missed you –" Troy was cut of my Gabriella pressing her lips against him, engaging him in another kiss, that made her feel weak in the knees. Gabriella pulled away moments later, and smiled radiantly.

"You felt it too, huh?" she whispered back. Troy smiled and nodded before leaning down again, and pressing his lips to hers in a chaste kiss.

"You bet I did. Now, I think we should get out of here, coz the last thing we need is Darbus writing us up for PDA." Troy said, grabbing Gabriella's hand and lacing their fingers together. Gabriella giggled, and it was at that moment that Troy realised how much he had missed her. Stopping suddenly, Troy felt Gabriella stumble into him, clearly confused at his actions.

"Troy?" she asked gently, reaching out for him.

"Just so you know, I never stopped being in love with you, Gabi. Not even when I said I hated you." Troy winced at his last words, but felt reassured when Gabriella just smiled at him.

"I know Wildcat, same here." She kissed him sweetly on the lips, before dropping to the soles of her feet. "Come on, I wanna go home." Gabriella said, as she entwined her fingers with his. As they both walked down the hallway, they both heard a random yell, which made their small smiles, broaden into grins.

"It's about fucking time!"

**Hmmm, I'm sort of happy with this story. Please, please, please review – I would mean a lot to me ******** Thanks – oh, and if you haven't already, please check out my other stories!**


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